Nacho Perez, Private Eye

Four hard-boiled detective short stories set in contemporary San Antonio, Texas. Nacho Perez, a former Marine drill instructor, uses his fists and his gun to get to the bottom of his cases. But he takes his lumps along the way.

In Badger Game, Nacho tries to recover money lost in a confidence scheme. In San Antonio Blues, he investigates a death written off by the police as an accidental drug overdose. In Search of El Dorado involves finding an heir to a fortune that the mob doesn't want found. Whiskey's for Drinking concerns a dispute over water rights in South Texas.

As a bonus, the collection ends with a flash-fiction detective story set in a futuristic New York City. The outcome turns on Asimov's First Law of Robotics.

Three of the five stories in the collection are prize winners. "Badger Game" won first place in the short-story category in the 2009 San Antonio Writers' Guild annual contest. "Whiskey's for Drinking" won second place in the short-story category in the 2014 San Antonio Writers' Guild annual contest. "The Butler Couldn't Have Done It" won first place in the flash-fiction category in the same contest.